Meat+Poultry - January 2019 - 62

LOGISTICS

from

FROZEN
to CHOSEN

iQ Foods is melting the stigma of chilled-solid meats
BY S T E V E K AY | m e a t p o u l t r y @ s o s l a n d.c o m

A

62

MEAT+ POULTRY | 01.19 | www.meatpoultry.com

Lobaugh has now created a growing business
with technology he believes is not replicated
anywhere else. Lobaugh formed iQ Foods,
based in Fayetteville, Arkansas, in 2006 and he
remains the sole owner and president.
Lobaugh declines to disclose details of how
the program works or volumes involved. But he
says its technology is tailored to and delivers on
certain requirements that each of his customers
asks for. The process goes well beyond the
normal freezing and thawing of meat.
Customers buy the meat then iQ Foods
takes ownership of it while it is in cold storage.
iQ Foods uses a variety of cold storage spaces
around the country and supervises the storage.
Time of storage varies according to the customer.
The company owns 80 percent of all the meat
during this time. The company then sells the
meat back to customers at the same price it
bought it, along with a fee based on volume and
length of stay. iQ Foods guarantees the quality of
products to its customers, Lobaugh says.
The Suspended Fresh program allows meat
buyers the ability to take positions during
seasonal windows in supply without using
additives or any changes in labeling, Lobaugh
says. All products maintain their original
packer box identity, dates and product codes.
The program helps solve seasonal issues of
pricing and availability. Most of the beef cuts
going into the program are middle meats and
thin meats, he says. But he consistently sees
the need for storage of lower-end cuts as well.
This also applies to pork and chicken.
As for consumers, they likely won't know
if that juicy ribeye steak they just enjoyed had
once been frozen. Would it matter if they knew,
is the question that begs to be answered.

©Mara Zemgaliete - stock.adobe.com

mericans want their red meat, especially
their beef, to be fresh, as well as juicy,
tender and flavorful. And they want beef
to look cherry red in the meat case. Woe betide
if a cut shows any kind of discoloration, even
though there might be nothing wrong with it.
It's no surprise then that frozen beef has
had little or no sales success in grocery stores.
The few frozen items that can be found are
often specialty imported cuts. Even frozen
ground beef, which would seem to be the beef
item most suited to freezing, is hard to find.
Consumers therefore might be fascinated,
or chagrined, to find that more and more retail
and foodservice meat buyers are using a cold
storage program that is said to go well beyond
the normal freezing and thawing of meat. They
are using the program to be able to guarantee
forward supplies of certain cuts of beef, pork and
poultry when they might be seasonally tight.
The program, trademarked as Suspended
Fresh, began just over 10 years ago. Use of
the program has grown in recent years as the
program has increasingly proven itself to meat
buyers. The program enables buyers to have
product held for weeks or even months, then
delivered to them equivalent to fresh product
in terms of moisture, tenderness and color
stability. How long products are stored makes
no difference to shelf life guarantees.
Suspended Fresh is the brainchild of former
IBP/Tyson Foods employee Brandon Lobaugh.
He foresaw a need for such a program 12
years ago and set about developing it. Lobaugh
worked at IBP and Tyson (which acquired IBP
in 2001) when Bob Peterson was chairman and
CEO. Peterson was an early and vocal advocate
for frozen beef. His efforts came to nothing but
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